GOP divides on 'Ponzi scheme'

WESTLAKE VILLAGE, Calif. – Mitt Romney launched a second wave of attacks Thursday on Rick Perry and Social Security – suddenly and unmistakably the central focus of the Republican race.

From talk radio to Twitter to Capitol Hill, Perry’s fiery description at Wednesday’s debate of Social Security as a “Ponzi scheme” was the grist for an intense dispute within the GOP family. At issue: how to address the viability of the prized entitlement and whether the Texan’s unapologetic embrace of the phrase he’d first used in his book “Fed Up!” could harm his prospects and those of other Republicans next year.

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Romney, sensing an opportunity to halt Perry’s surge in the polls, went even further than he did on the debate stage, asserting in blunt terms that the new frontrunner had rendered himself unelectable and that his nomination could lead to a 2012 GOP wipe-out.

“If we nominate someone who the Democrats could correctly characterize as being against Social Security we would be obliterated as a party,” the former Massachusetts governor said without prompting in an afternoon appearance on Sean Hannity’s radio show.

Romney also sought to steer the focus away from Perry’s debate language.

“The issue is not so much about how we finance Social Security,” Romney told Hannity. “It’s that Gov. Perry, in his book ‘Fed Up,’ said Social Security has been ‘forced on us’ and by no measure is Social Security anything but ‘a failure.’ That is being against not just how you finance Social Security, but being against Social Security.”

Back in Boston, Romney’s campaign wasted little time in their effort to stoke the dispute, blasting out an opposition research document Thursday morning entitled: “RICK PERRY: RECKLESS, WRONG ON SOCIAL SECURITY”

In it, Romney’s team included Perry quotes from his book and book tour last year not about the health of the entitlement, but about its very existence as a federal program — fodder that they think is more politically perilous for the Texan than what he said at the POLITICO/NBC debate here.

“Why is the federal government even in the pension program or the health care delivery program?” Perry asked in an appearance promoting his book last November on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” “Let the states do it.”

Perry didn’t bring up the subject in a speech to Orange County Republicans Thursday morning, but told reporters as he shook hands that Romney’s claim that he wants to abolish the program is “misinformation.”

Perry’s campaign, seeking to get back on offense, was more aggressive — and proved that two can play the book oppo game.

In a press release, Perry officials noted that Romney used his policy book, “No Apology,” to liken the management of Social Security to a felony.

“Suppose two grandparents created a trust fund, appointed a bank as trustee, and instructed the bank to invest the proceeds of the trust fund so as to provide for their grandchildren’s education,” Romney wrote in the book. “Suppose further that the bank used the proceeds for its own purposes, so that when the grandchildren turned eighteen, there was no money for them to go to college. What would happen to the bankers responsible for misusing the money? They would go to jail. But what has happened to the people responsible for the looming bankruptcy of Social Security? They keep returning to Congress every two years.”

Perry’s camp also noted that on the campaign trail late last month, Romney had said: “I don’t know of any Republican who’s running for office who said they want to cut Social Security or Medicare benefits to people who are retired or near retirement. Not one, I haven’t heard a word of it.”